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I May Never Find a Full-Time Job Again
Striving and surviving in my 50s in a very crowded profession
For only the third time in the last 20 years, I find myself unemployed at the age of 58. I was laid off on June 4th from a large e-commerce retailer while I was on vacation. While I was on vacation! My boss sent me a Microsoft Teams message at 9:30 am on a Wednesday to see if I could meet with her for a quick “touch base” at 10 am. As soon as I logged into the meeting and saw the split screen with my boss and an HR rep, I knew it was over. She simply read from a script, told me I’d get one month’s severance, and asked if I had any questions. I was too stunned to say anything, and I said “No” and hung up.
One month earlier, I had just gotten a stellar review, a raise, and a bonus. When talking to my fellow laid-off coworkers, I learned it had nothing to do with our performance, and everything to do with the company’s bottom line. The company had experienced a bad first fiscal quarter, and management wanted to implement cost savings. And just like that, half of the design department was gone.
My career up until now
I changed careers in 2004 after getting my Master’s Degree in Human-Computer Interaction. This is more commonly known as User Experience Design these days. The exact career I…